Share This Story!

'She has all of us': Santa Fe community holds funeral for Pakistani student with no family in U.S.

Unlike the others who were gunned down at a Texas high school, Pakistani exchange student Sabika Sheikh didn't have family in the U.S. to plan her funeral. But that didn't stop her adopted community. The 17-year-old had been attending classes at Santa Fe High School since last August.

'She has all of us': Santa Fe community holds funeral for Pakistani student with no family in U.S.

On Sunday funeral services were held for 17-year-old Pakistani exchange student Sabika Sheikh, who had been attending Santa Fe High School since last August when she was killed Friday in a shooting. (May 20)
AP

A Texas Department of Public Safety officer places crime scene tape across Santa Fe High School on May 19, 2018, the day after a mass shooting.(Photo: Courtney Sacco/Caller-Times/USA TODAY NETWORK)

SANTA FE — Unlike the others who were gunned down at a Texas high school, Pakistani exchange student Sabika Sheikh didn't have family in the U.S. to plan her funeral.

But that didn't stop her adopted community. The 17-year-old, who had been attending classes at Santa Fe High School since last August, was honored at her funeral Sunday afternoon at a mosque in suburban Houston.

The Islamic Society for Greater Houston planned the service and opened it to the public, leading to an overflowing crowd. It was the first funeral for any of the 10 killed in Friday's shooting.

"She doesn't have any family here, but she has all of us and this whole community that is mourning," said MJ Khan, president of the organization. "We are all there to be her family."

She had been staying with a host family that lives near the high school and was due back home in Pakistan in just a few weeks for the holiday marking the end of Ramadan. As those in the community walked into the mosque, many greeted the teen's host family with hugs and words of support.

Jason Cogburn, her host father, told stories of Sheikh's potential and how different her culture was from Texas. They learned from each other, and his family even fasted with her during Ramadan. One thing united them more than anything, he said: love.

"We loved her and she loved us," he said, adding the "root of our issues is love. Because when people love each other, these kinds of things don’t happen."

Cogburn said he planned on carrying on her legacy and believed she is in a better place with God. "She will be very missed, but she will always be loved," he said.

CLOSE

Charity Killman, who lives adjacent to the property that police searched for explosive devices in connection to the attack at a Texas high school says nobody lived in the trailer but she had seen the suspect come and go all the time. (May 19)
AP

His wife, Joleen, and daughter, Jaelyn, talked about the close bond they formed with the teen over the six months she stayed in their home. The family thanked her family in Pakistan for giving them a small amount of time with the teen, whom they described as a caring and wonderful person.

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said the teen’s aspirations of becoming a diplomat for her country in the U.S. will always live on.

“Even through her death, she will continue to be a diplomat. Even in her death, she is pulling the relationships between Pakistan and the United States, specifically the Houston area, even closer, " he said.

Something needs to change to stop these tragedies from taking so many young people, Turner said. "I'm almost to the point where you almost become speechless because these incidents are happening way too much," he said. "The best way we can honor Sabika is to take preventable steps to try and mitigate this from happening again."

The funeral for Sabika Sheikh, the 17-year-old Pakistani exchange student killed in the Santa Fe High shooting, is overflowing Masjid al-Sabireen mosque pic.twitter.com/aINoLr1YyA

Her body will be taken to Pakistan, where her family will also hold a service.

Many in the Santa Fe area aimed to find solace by turning to Sunday church services.

Interim Pastor Jerl Watkins had planned the morning sermon at Arcadia First Baptist Church to be geared for graduating high school seniors. Instead, he had to preach to pews full of grieving Santa Fe residents who were still questioning how it was possible that their small town could become the scene of the deadliest school shooting in Texas history.

“We have fallen away from God and put other gods in front of Him,” Watkins said. “God is not a genie that we can rub from a magic lamp. He is a loving Father that wants a lifelong relationship with us.”

Ten crisis-trained chaplains from the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team were invited by the church to help Santa Fe residents move forward and heal. There are more than 3,000 chaplains with the non-denominational Christian organization.

Gov. Greg Abbott and his wife, Cecilia Abbott, attended the service and met with survivors of the shooting and members of the community, the governor's second trip to Santa Fe.

Abbott hugged grieving parishioners and spoke with survivors, including Monica Bracknell, an 18-year-old senior at Santa Fe High School.

Surrounded by cameras, Bracknell told the governor she doesn’t think the shooting should be turned into a political battle over gun control and said she doesn't believe guns were to blame in the attack.

Bracknell said that before the service, she went to her school to collect belongings left behind in the chaos of the shooting. She said she and her classmates are “shaken up” but coping.

Meanwhile, authorities on Sunday were still in the beginning stages of their investigation, hoping to find a motive in the shooting and whether anyone else knew or helped suspect Dimitrios Pagourtzis in the attack.

Pagourtzis' family released a statement Saturday saying they were cooperating with authorities but were just as "shocked and confused as anyone else."

The comments were the first since authorities say the teen took his father's shotgun and .38 revolver and opened fire Friday morning.

"We are saddened and dismayed," the family said in a statement given to reporters. "We extend our most heartfelt prayers and condolences to all of the victims."

Police have not given a motive for the shooting, but the family of one victim said their daughter was targeted because she had rejected Pagourtzis' attempts to date her. The mother of Shana Fisher, a 16-year-old student killed in the attack, said the shooting followed months of advances from Pagourtzis and came just days after Fisher embarrassed him in front of others by telling him she wouldn't go out with him.